Top Eight

Top eight CNS stories for today including the maker of OxyContin pleaded guilty to fraud and conspiracy and will pay more than $8 billion in fines; New polling in the battleground state of Iowa shows Democrats taking narrow leads in the presidential and Senate races; Conservatives rallying against the reelection of President Trump launched an ad campaign in Midwest battleground states that plays on an iconic Republican ad, and more.

Your Wednesday night briefing from the staff of Courthouse News

Top eight CNS stories for today including the maker of OxyContin pleaded guilty to fraud and conspiracy and will pay more than $8 billion in fines; New polling in Iowa shows Democrats taking narrow leads in the presidential and Senate races; Conservatives rallying against the reelection of President Trump launched an ad campaign in Midwest battleground states that plays on an iconic Republican ad, and more.

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National

1.) The maker of OxyContin pleaded guilty on Wednesday to three charges of fraud and conspiracy and will pay more than $8 billion in fines.

FILE - This Tuesday, May 8, 2007, file photo shows the Purdue Pharma logo at its offices in Stamford, Conn. Arizona's attorney general is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to force the Sackler family, which owns OxyContin-maker Purdue Pharma, to return billions of dollars they took out of the company. The court filing on Wednesday, July 31, 2019, marks the first time the high court has been asked to weigh in directly on the nation's opioid crisis. (AP Photo/Douglas Healey, File)

2.) A group of conservatives rallying against the reelection of President Trump launched an ad campaign Wednesday in the battleground states of Iowa, Ohio and Pennsylvania that plays on an iconic Republican ad.

President Donald Trump talks with reporters at Andrews Air Force Base after attending a campaign rally in Latrobe, Pa., Thursday, Sept. 3, 2020, at Andrews Air Force Base, Md. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

3.) From his encouragement of the Proud Boys to his slowing of down the mail, the president’s threats to Election Day peace of mind are many and varied, Latino voters claim in a new lawsuit.

Residents in San Antonio wait in line at the Bexar County Elections Department on Oct. 5, 2020, hours before the close of voter registration in Texas for the 2020 presidential elections. (Courthouse News photo / Erik De La Garza)

4.) The Trump administration’s failure to consider the Deepwater Horizon oil rig explosion in a recent assessment of the harm offshore drilling could do to endangered species triggered a lawsuit from a slew of conservationists Wednesday.

Weathered oil is seen on the water near the coast of Louisiana after the explosion and collapse of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in 2010. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert, File)

5.) The defamation suit pitting President Donald Trump against a columnist he is accused of raping decades earlier hit a coronavirus-related snag Wednesday less than an hour before a court hearing.

FILE - In this March 4, 2020, E. Jean Carroll talks to reporters outside a courthouse in New York. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig, File)

Regional

6.) New polling in the battleground state of Iowa shows Democrats taking narrow leads in the presidential and Senate races, suggesting a radical turnaround from President Donald Trump’s 9-point victory there in 2016.

Former Vice President Joe Biden works the grill during the Polk County Democrats Steak Fry on Sept. 21, 2019, in Des Moines, Iowa. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)

7.) Handing a loss to the Trump campaign, the full Fourth Circuit refused late Tuesday to roll back North Carolina’s extension to the deadline for tallying absentee ballots.

President Donald Trump reacts to the crowd as he arrives to speak at a campaign rally at Smith Reynolds Airport, Tuesday, Sept. 8, 2020, in Winston-Salem, N.C. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

8.) The Trump administration’s rollback of environmental regulations has paved the way for a mining company to skirt federal permitting and commence a controversial project near Georgia’s Okefenokee Swamp.

FILE-In this Thursday, April 3, 1997 file photo, the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge in southeast Ga., is is seen. A mining company said Tuesday it plans to dig for minerals without a federal permit at the edge of the vast wildlife refuge in the Okefenokee Swamp, a big step for a once-embattled project that's now benefitting from the Trump administration's rollback of environmental rules. (Stuart Tannehill/Florida Times-Union via AP, File)

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